** The issue of counterterrorism (or lack thereof) in Brazil is an issue
I’ve been meaning to write on. Especially now if there are political
elements in brazil trying to make this into a big public issue, we can
address this in good depth

The Makled issue is dead. Santos is naive and Uribe is furious. He told us
to ‘go after him’ (meaning Santos,) and is accusing Santos of ‘ruining his
legacy.’ Santos is getting money paid back from VZ, chavez is building a
bridge, etc. etc., but this cooperation will not last forever. Colombia
just lost its leverage.

Now Santos is facing trouble with the US Congress on the FTA. There’s
enough support within Congress to block the agreement most likely, and the
Tea Partiers are the easiest to get on board to block it. Lugar is also
part of this campaign.

We are working with Veja (major Brazilian newsmagazine – correct me if im
wrong, but im pretty sure they’re more center-right in their politics) to
get Brazil to take counterterrorism seriously. The games are around the
corner, and nothing has been done. As we’ve discussed before, Brazil
doesn’t have a counterterrorism law and doesn’t acknowledge terrorism as
an issue because it doesn’t want to become a target. Brazil will track
movements of Hezbollah and other groups in the tri-border area, but they
dont want to make any big moves. Brazil’s national police are now feeding
Veja tons of information on the militants they’ve been tracking. They want
to expose all this info to put the Dilma government on the spot. The info
is detailed and pretty damning. It includes the recent movements of Hassan
Izz al Din (Argentina bomber). They also recently caught someone smuggling
yellow cake in northern brazil.

I don’t see any threat to Chavez internally right now. The VZ opposition
is lazy and corrupt as hell. WIthin the inner elite, everyone is taken
care of. The militia isn’t being viewed as a threat. The Chinese money is
coming in, and the relationship is becoming a lot more political. China
knows that they need Chavez to see these investments through and to get
paid back. They’re trying to pass lessons on hwo to contain dissent and
how to be prepared should an uprising occur.

Am meeting with the Costa Rican president tomorrow. They asked us to look
into who financed Nicaragua’s dredging of the San Juan river (this has
caused a major issue between the two countries.) They traced it back to
Iranian funding. Iran and China wanted to test the waters and see if they
could develop this new trade pass.

(I asked the source about the Die Welt rumors again and made clear with a
smile i knew he was behind them. he laughed and said look, this isn’t
cuban missile crisis. we have the documentation and the sat photos of the
components of the Shahabs and the assembly plant. He saw the skepticism on
my face and said he’ll bring it to me next week when we meet again. I’m
still really skeptical about these claims, of course, but i want to see
the alleged evidence first hand.

After talking a bit with the Eurasia team there’s some reason to believe
that Russia may be interested in expanding in to Peru (as well as other
places).
This article summarizes the consulting firm’s take on the visit and how it
interprets different actions taken by Humala so far as indicators that
this interest is legit. It does provide as much concrete info as I’d like
but that’s ok.
Original is below in Spanish and good translate follows. Specific
translation or clarifications are available upon request. Let me know if
you have follow up questions, as there’s a decent chance I can keep him
talking about this for a bit longer.

Special Report August 2, 2011
Instrumentation Russia and Gas Policy
When the USSR disintegrated, Russia hampered its influence in Europe, Asia
and the world in general. The transition from being a world power, in a
bipolar world, to be a second-rate power with an army inefficient, with
dwindling foreign political power was a reality until the end of the
twentieth century. And a Russian imperative was to overcome this political
isolation in the big world decisions.

Because of very harsh winters in Europe, the Russian gas becomes essential
for the survival of Europe. From Germany to Italy was experiencing a
dependency on Russian gas and thus the Russian state, the owner of
Gazprom.

This dependence on Russian gas to Russia has become a major player again
in Europe. European governments are particularly careful when condemning
human rights violations in Russia because of European dependence on this
resource. Even the EU has not delivered on-time invasions-Russian army to
several new states formerly part of the USSR with violations of
international law and human rights at stake.

But Russia wants to expand its political influence in the resource-based
gas-to the world. Carry out policies of penetration in Asia, India with
singular political success so far by offering three products: Weapons, gas
and nuclear power. And that’s the modus operandi Russian commercial and
political penetration still possible to call commercial diplomacy of arms.

For South America, specifically Peru, Humala Alexis meeting had three
components. And as for the XXI Century Russian geopolitical control of gas
fields in the world is a survival imperative. It uses tried and tested
formulas, in Peru in the seventies-arms for natural resources. A careful
analysis of the meeting of Alexis Humala leads to the conclusion that such
a scenario was proposed in Russia in the President’s brother.

This analysis reveals that the choice of a retired Army General for the
Ministry of Defence is neither casual nor free. Ensure a reset first
Peruvian Russian equipment, which suffers from serious flaws in its
maintenance and operation, but it would be useful for the political aims
of the Russian state in its policy of trade expansion and gas
Peru would be an excellent means of payment for the acquisition of such
weapons. Therefore, the elected Minister of Defense Daniel Mora started
the week with anti-Chilean speeches published in the national press and
then disavowed by the elected Chancellor.

This scenario coincides with the interest of the parliamentarians elected
in Cusco Peru Win. They want the resolution of the Camisea contract taking
into regional president an ally in that regard. It will be necessary to
observe the national political development for further evaluation.

Just a comment about the article published today regarding the alleged
iranian plot.

I am a firm believer that mexican drug cartels don`t have any dealings
with foreign terrorist groups. They will not risk their main business to
become international terrorists. Besides, muslims and mexicans don`t mix
very well.

As you well know, Mexico keeps an immigration alert database containing
information related to international fugitives and suspects of other
crimes like terrorism.

Every day mexican immigration authorities encounter subjects on the alert
system who are not allowed to enter Mexico and are sent back to the point
of origin of their trip, notifying the recipient authorities.

That is exactly what happened with Manssor Arbabsiar. He was denied entry
and sent back to the US where he was arrested.

What is being said about the “cooperation” from the mexican government to
avoid the plot makes me laugh. The only cooperation was that we caught
Arbabsiar at the mexican airport and sent him back to the US just on the
fact that he was on the aforementioned alert.

The cooperation and communication between Mexico and the US is on it`s
lowest level.

You know that Mexico is not fully cooperating with the US since the
“wikileaks” reports showing that your Ambassador Carlos Pascual was
sending messages with “derogatory” information about mexican
authoritiesand after the “Fast and Furious Operation”.

Those incidents caused a fracture on the bi-lateral relation, mainly in
the mexican side.

Mexico now is keeping a lid on open communication with the US with the
only exception when Mexico has a benefit (like the Merida Plan).